By  WILLIAM    C.    DOANE 

Bishop  of  Albany 


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JAN  23  1912 


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hmki  t,^ 


THE   BEDELL   LECTURES 


Evidence  •  Experience  •  Influence 


-sv 


rs. 


The  Bedell  Lecture! 

EVIDENCE 

EXPERIENCE 

INFLUENCE 

DELIVERED   AT   GAMBIER,  OHIO 
NOVEMBER,  1903 

WILLIAM  C.   DOANE 


JAN  23  1912 


BISHOP   OF   ALBANY 


EDWIN    S.    GORHAM 

Church  Missions  House 

New  York 


Copyright,  1904,  by  Edtvin  S.   Gorham 


Published,  February,  1904 


THE  TROW  PRESS,    NEW   YORK 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

EXTRACTS 7 

I 
EVIDENCE 11 

M 
EXPERIENCE      .        .        .        .        .        .        .43 

m 

INFLUENCE        . 69 


FOUNDERS'  MEMORIAL        .  .  97 


EXTRACTS 

from  the  communication  of  the  donors  to 
the  Board  of  Trustees  of  the  Theo- 
logical Seminary  of  the  Diocese  of 
Ohio  and  Kenyon  College. 

Cleveland,  June  21,  1880. 

Gentlemen  :  We  have  consecrated  and 
set  apart  for  the  service  of  God  the  sum 
of  $5,000,  to  be  devoted  to  the  estabhsh- 
ment  of  a  lecture,  or  lectures,  in  the  in- 
stitutions at  Gambier  on  the  "  Evidences 
of  Natural  and  Revealed  Rehgion;  or,  the 
Relations  of  Science  and  Religion." 
[7] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 

We  ask  permission  of  the  Trustees  to 
establish  the  lecture  immediately,  with  the 
following  provisions: 

The  lecture,  or  lectures,  shall  be  deliv- 
ered biennially  on  Founders'  Day  (if  such 
a  day  shall  be  established),  or  other  ap- 
propriate time.  During  our  lifetime,  or 
the  lifetime  of  either  of  us,  the  nomina- 
tion of  the  lectureship  shall  rest  with  us. 

The  interest  for  two  years  on  the  fund, 
less  the  sum  necessary  to  pay  for  the  pub- 
lication, shall  be  paid  to  the  lecturer. 

The  lecturer  also  shall  be  paid  one-half 
of  the  net  profits  of  the  publication  dur- 
ing the  first  two  years  after  the  date  of 
publication.  All  other  profits  shall  be  the 
property  of  the  Board,  and  shall  be  added 
to  the  capital  of  the  lectureship. 

We  express  our  preference  that  the 
lecture,  or  lectures,  shall  be  delivered  in 
[8] 


Extracts 
the  Church  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  if  such 
building  be  in  existence,  and  shall  be  de- 
livered in  the  presence  of  all  the  members 
of  the  institutions  under  the  authority  of 
the  Board. 

We  ask  that  the  day  on  which  the  lect- 
ure, or  the  first  of  each  series  of  lectures, 
shall  be  delivered,  shall  be  declared  a 
hoHday. 

We  wish  that  the  nomination  to  this 
lectureship  shall  be  restricted  by  no  other 
consideration  than  the  ability  of  the 
appointee  to  discharge  the  duty  to  the 
highest  glory  of  God  in  the  completest 
presentation  of  the  subject.  We  desire 
that  the  lectures  shall  be  published  in  uni- 
form shape,  and  that  a  copy  of  each  shall 
be  placed  in  the  libraries  of  Bexley  Hall, 
Kenyon  College,  and  of  the  Philomathe- 
sian  and  Nu  Pi  Kappa  Society.  Ask- 
[9] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
ing   the   favorable   consideration   of   the 
Board  of  Trustees, 

We  remain,  with  great  respect, 

G.  T.  Bedell, 
Julia  Bedell. 

The  Board  accepted  the  gift,  approved 
the  terms,  and  named  All  Saints'  Day, 
November  1st,  as  Fomiders'  Day,  and 
made  it  a  holiday. 


[10] 


I 

EVIDENCE 


+  •(■■!•  ■!■■!■  1  !■■!■  l'-i--i--l--H-i'-l--l'l-  !■  I-  I  I-  !!■  M    1!    I  i    11  'M' -I- ■!■•{• 

EVIDENCE 

EXPERIENCE 

INFLUENCE 


EVIDENCE 

JUST  because  the  range  of  subjects 
is  so  very  wide,  it  is  not  easy  to 
choose  that  which  may  have  in  it 
a  certain  element  of  freshness,  and  still 
more,  of  helpfuhiess  to  those  for  whom, 
ahke  in  the  purpose  of  the  founder  and 
the  intention  of  the  speaker,  these  lect- 
ures are  primarily  intended.  And  in  the 
choice  which  I  have  made  I  am  a  bit  puz- 
zled as  to  what  ought  to  be  the  order  of 
the  subjects.  If  one  is  thinking  of  a  life 
born  and  nurtured  in  the  atmosphere  of 
[13] 


Evidence^  Experience^  Influence 
religion,  the  order  which  I  have  chosen 
must  needs  be  inverted,  because  the  first 
approach  of  God  to  the  soul  would  have 
been  through  the  deep  and  sacred  impres- 
sion of  the  home.     Out  of  that  would 
grow  the  experience  as  the  nature  assim- 
ilated  and   absorbed   the   influence,   and 
these  together,  perhaps  without  the  need 
of  any  searching,  would  be  to  the  indi- 
vidual, and  in  him  to  others,  the  surest 
evidence    of    Christianity.     I    recognize, 
too,  another  difficulty  in  drawing  very 
definite  lines  of  demarcation,  because  each 
one  of  the  three  may  in  a  sense  be  counted 
evidence  of  the  strongest  kind.     There 
is  a  sort  of  tri-unity  among  them  which 
makes  them  difficult  to  divide.     Just  as 
in   considering   the   classification   of   the 
senses  there  is  not  only  no  need  of  in- 
venting a  sixth  sense,  but  it  is  almost 
truer  and  more  accurate  to  count  the  five 
[14] 


Evidence 
as  one;  because  they  so  depend  upon  con- 
tact y  with  the  palate,  with  the  eye,  with 
the  ear, — with  the  organ  of  taste  or  sight 
or  smell  or  hearing, — that  one  might  call 
them  only  one  sense,  namely,  the  sense 
of  touch.  And  while  that  reduces  deU- 
cate  and  subtle  things  to  a  most  material 
level,  it  is  simply  another  way  of  show- 
ing how  limited  all  our  mere  physical 
faculties  must  be  in  the  range  and  reach 
of  their  power,  since  through  them  we 
can  only  know  things  that  are  within 
touching  distance  somehow  of  ourselves. 
I  am  inclined,  on  the  whole,  to  stick  to 
the  order  laid  down;  and  speak  to  you 
first  of  evidence,  the  tested  proof  of  the 
inner  and  imseen  things  by  which  we  can 
know  God.  Ages  ago  on  that  famous 
hill  in  Athens,  St.  Paul  found  those  very 
God-fearing  people,  having  exhausted  all 
their  store  of  names  in  the  roll  of  known, 
[15] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
or  at  least  of  named  divinities,  resorting 
to  a  very  pathetic  title,  and  putting  on 
one  altar  the  inscription  to  "  an,"  not 
"  the,"  but  "  an  unknown  God,"  oLyvcoa-Tdi 
6e(o.  There  are  some  altars  at  which 
men  are  worshipping  to-day  which  ought 
to  be  thus  inscribed,  for  the  God  whom 
some  men  worship  is  not  the  God  who 
reveals  Himself  to  us  in  any  of  His 
revelations,  natural  or  spiritual.  Worse 
than  this,  it  is  true  that  many  men  will 
have  no  altar  and  will  offer  no  worship, 
on  this  very  gromid  of  unknowableness 
and  with  a  strange  self-condemnation 
adopt  to  themselves  a  title  borrowed  from 
this  old  utterance  of  despair, — the  agnos- 
tic, because  the  God  is  ayvoxxro^.  I  do 
not  take  the  time  to  dwell  upon  either 
one  of  these  two  points,  but  I  am  quite 
sure  that  you  and  I  can  recall  certain 
statements  of  theology  and  certain  the- 
[16] 


Evidence 
ories  of  religion  so  absolutely  inconsist- 
ent with  the  nature  either  of  God  or  of 
man,  that  whoever  holds  them  does  not 
know  God.  And  it  is  equally  familiar 
to  us  all  that  with  a  strange  confusion 
in  any  intelligent  use  of  words,  men  un- 
dertake to-day  to  exclude,  from  the  very 
element  to  which  it  most  naturally  be- 
longs, that  blessed  faculty  of  belief  which 
they  are  willing  to  use  upon  the  ordinary 
things  of  common  experience,  and  un- 
willing to  apply  in  the  realm  in  which 
it  is  especially  at  home.  Meanwhile  it 
is  not  too  much  to  say  that,  universally, 
human  nature  craves  a  known  God. 
JNIonstrous  exceptions  there  have  been 
and  there  will  be,  but  if  you  take  either 
end  of  a  man's  life, — the  child  with  its 
up -looking  dependence,  its  conscious  rec- 
ognition of  an  unseen  presence,  its  reali- 
zation, sometimes  in  fear,  but  oftener  in 
[17] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
assurance,  of  a  higher  power,  of  a  reakn 
and  region  of  immaterial  reahty;  or,  if 
you  take  the  old  man,  with  a  loosened 
hold  upon  the  things  of  sense,  and  a  need 
that  is  hungry  and  eager  for  some  mani- 
festation of  that  which  lies  beyond, — it  is 
not  too  much  to  say  that  there  is  a  crav- 
ing in  human  nature  for  a  God  known. 
Such  an  instinct  implanted  in  man  means 
the  possibility  of  its  satisfaction,  means 
the  existence  of  that  for  which  it  longs, 
and  we  have  the  very  highest  authority 
for  saying  that,  alike  in  the  suggestions 
of  natural  religion,  or  even  in  the  gro- 
tesque caricatiu'es  of  pagan  invention 
there  is  a  glimpse  of  God.  Never  left 
"  without  witness,"  "  ignorantly  wor- 
shipped "  under  most  unhkely  forms, 
God  "  in  divers  manners  and  in  divers 
portions,"  strange  ways  some  of  them, 
and  mere  fragments,  so  to  speak,  of  truth, 
[18] 


Evidence 
God  spake,  and  it  was  God  who  spake  in 
time  past.  It  is  quite  true  that  men  by 
searching  cannot  find  out  God,  but  it  is 
also  true  that  the  mere  fact  of  searching 
has  been  always  an  intimation  of  the 
great  fact  of  God,  and  that  this  very 
failure  has  been  witness  to  the  need,  and 
intimation  of  the  gift,  of  a  revelation 
which  should  make  Him  known.  We 
are  concerned,  it  seems  to  me,  with  the 
consideration  of  the  way  in  which  to-day 
God  can  be  known.  The  divers  man- 
ners and  the  divers  portions  of  the  past 
are  matters  of  curious  inquiry  and  evi- 
dence of  a  great  consistent  fact,  namely, 
the  progressiveness  of  God's  dealing  with 
men.  And  as  they  pile  up  and  accumu- 
late, they  are  in  themselves  strong  side- 
Hghts  of  evidence.  Even  idols  and  hu- 
man sacrifice  and  the  deifying  of  created 
things  and  the  apotheosis,  that  is  to  say, 
[19] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
the  God-making  of  heroes,  have  in  them 
rough-hewn  suggestions  of  the  great  truth 
of  God  made  man  and  of  the  offering 
of  that  Man  upon  the  cross.  And  then 
those  unused  arguments,  useful  in  their 
day,  from  design,  from  comparative 
reHgions,  from  corrupt  traditions  con- 
trasted with  the  pure  revelation,  are  in- 
teresting subjects  of  research.  But  the 
teacher  and  the  learner  of  to-day  are  con- 
cerned with  the  evidence  of  to-day.  And 
I  am  quite  sure  that  in  the  babel  con- 
fusion of  irreligious  and  anti-christian 
tongues  we  are  wise  to  concentrate  our 
attention  upon  the  one  point,  of  God 
revealed  to  us  in  the  person  of  Jesus 
Christ.  I  know  that  His  supreme  and 
sublime  personality  appeals  on  different 
groimds  and  in  varying  degrees  to  differ- 
ent minds.  To  the  Hebrew  He  is  the  last 
and  the  greatest  of  the  prophets.  To 
[20] 


Evidence 
the  Unitarian  He  is  the  flower  and  finest 
fruitage  of  human  character.  To  certain 
others  who  profess  and  call  themselves 
Christians,  He  is  the  one  absolutely  sin- 
less and  perfect  man.  One  wonders  at 
such  illogical  inconsistency  as  one  recalls 
that  the  reason  of  om*  Lord's  crucifixion 
was  that  the  Jews  condemned  Him  for 
blasphemy  because  He  made  Himself 
equal  with  God;  for  surely  He  could  not 
be  the  greatest  Hebrew  prophet,  or  the 
man  without  sin,  if  He  were  guilty  of 
blasphemy.  But  letting  men  settle  that 
for  themselves,  Jesus  Christ  stands  the 
central  figure  in  all  history;  and  century 
after  century  as  it  rolls  by  and  leaves 
Him  in  this  prominent  position,  makes 
clearer  and  stronger  the  fact  that  in  Him 
God  is  revealed,  and  that  in  Him  there 
is  a  ground  of  appeal  to  every  fairly  in- 
telhgent  mind.  I  mean  that  in  our  argu- 
[21] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
ment  we  must  begin  with  Him  and  argue 
from  Him,  His  personality,  His  charac- 
ter. His  influence,  instead  of  beginning 
somewhere  else  and  arguing  on  to  Him. 
Let  us  try  to  prove  this  by  the  conditions 
and  contentions  of  much  modern  and 
popular  controversy.  Christ  is  revealed 
to  us  first  in  the  Holy  Scriptm-es,  and 
the  study  of  prophecy  and  type  in  the 
Old  Testament  and  of  biography  and 
dogma  in  the  New  Testament  are  of 
infinite  necessitj^  and  importance.  But 
what  is  called  the  higher  criticism  occu- 
pies itself  so  much  with  authorship  and 
authenticity  and  textual  accuracy  and 
chronological  order  that  it  fails  to  find 
or  to  look  for  Him  of  whom  "  Moses  and 
the  law  and  the  prophets  did  write." 
'Back  to  the  minutest  and  most  micro- 
scopic examination  of  the  words  of  the 
Holy  Scripture  we  must  go,  but  "  the 
[22] 


Evidence 
battle  of  the  books"  is  not  the  starting 
point;  and  while  men  are  doubting  and 
disputing  the  age  and  the  authority  of 
the  Bible  it  is  idle  to  ask  them  to  accept 
its  statements  as  the  first  or  as  the  final 
evidence  of  God.  It  is  like  showing 
brilhant  colors  to  a  blind  eye,  or  discours- 
ing sweet  music  to  the  ear  of  the  deaf. 
It  makes  no  appeal.  It  answers  no  de- 
mand. It  responds  to  no  need.  If  we 
have  found  God  in  Christ,  you  and  I, 
we  must  take  His  own  word  to  the  two 
disciples,  "  Come  see,"  see  Him,  "  in 
whom  dwelleth  all  the  fulness  of  the 
Godhead  bodily."  So  it  seems  to  me 
we  are  mistaken  when  we  seek  to  bring 
men  to  acknowledge  Christ  and  to  own 
God  in  Him  by  what  is  known  as  the 
evidence  of  miracles.  We  must  prove 
the  miracles  by  Christ,  and  not  Christ 
by  the  miracles.  One  is  tempted  to  re- 
[23] 


Evidencej,  Eocperience,  Influence 
gret  sometimes  that  this  word  has  found 
its  way  so  prominently  and  so  con- 
stantly into  om-  English  Bible  and  our 
English  speech.  It  is  the  very  lowest  of 
all  the  descriptive  words,  in  the  orig- 
inal, of  those  acts  of  omnipotence  which 
marked  with  marvellous  beauty  the  story 
of  om'  Lord's  earthly  life.  It  is  the 
Latin  translation,  done  into  English,  of 
the  Greek  word  re/aa?,  which  is  never 
used  by  itself  to  describe  these  works  of 
Christ.  The  true  word  is  o-rjixeCov,  a  sign. 
From  the  wedding  feast  at  Cana  to  the 
last  of  those  great  works  of  mighty 
mercy  there  were  never  "  miracles "  or 
wonders  alone,  but  always  either  "  signs," 
or  "  signs  and  wonders" ;  and  their  appeal 
is  always,  not  to  the  amazement  or  aston- 
ishment, but  to  the  instruction  and  con- 
viction of  those  for  whom  and  before 
whom  they  were  wrought.  To  fling 
[24] 


Evidence 
them  baldly  at  the  unbeliever  is  to  pro- 
voke denial  and  prevent  belief.  It  is 
written  of  the  first  of  these  great  signs 
that  only  those  who  were  already  His 
disciples  believed  in  Him;  and  to-day  I 
am  quite  sure  that  the  argument  from 
miracles  is  for  disciples  and  not  for  de- 
niers:  that  is  to  say,  the  argument  from 
what  are  called  the  miracles  which  Jesus 
wrought,  and  which  ought  to  be  called  the 
signs  which  He  showed.  But  before  and 
behind  all,  in  our  appeal  to  those  who  do 
not  believe  hes  the  miracle  of  the  Christ 
Himself,  the  sign  that  He  was,  the  won- 
der that  He  was,  and  the  sign  and  the 
wonder  that  He  is  to-day. 

Here  we  begin,  and  here  we  stand  face 
to  face  with  certain  facts.  One  may 
study  Christ  in  many  places  and  in  many 
ways, — the  Christ  in  prophecy,  the  Christ 
in  biography,  the  Christ  in  history.  Or, 
[25] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
when  He  is  known,  one  may  come  to  Him 
for  love  and  honor  and  worship  and  help 
and  consolation,  in  His  Word,  in  His 
sacraments,  in  His  ministry,  in  His 
Church.  But  the  personality  of  Jesus 
Christ,  the  revealer  of  God,  as  we  ex- 
amine it,  is  the  overwhelming  proof,  the 
incontrovertible  argument,  the  irresisti- 
ble evidence  of  God,  of  religion,  of  Chris- 
tianity. 

Poor  George  Romanes, — rich  George 
Romanes  rather — when  he  was  passing 
back  from  scientific  doubt  to  religious 
belief  used  to  say,  "  Why  is  the  Gospel 
story  so  natural,  why  can  we  find  no  flaw 
in  Jesus  Christ?  Were  not  His  words, 
after  all,  the  words  of  truth,  telling  the 
mind  of  God,  infinitely  more  accurately 
than  any  reading  of  nature?"  And  as 
he  queried,  he  prayed,  and  the  old  faith 
came  back  to  him.  Let  it  be  granted 
[26] 


Evidence 
that  there  are  questions  raised  about  the 
trustworthiness  of  records,  about  the 
authorship  of  the  Gospels,  about  the  au- 
thenticity of  a  passage  here  or  there,  etc. 
Men  may  have  to  go,  some  men  at  least, 
back  through  the  weary  waste  of  wit- 
nesses to  these;  but  not  first;  because 
Jesus  Christ  to-day  stands  out  in  life  and 
fact,  in  influence,  in  power,  in  reality,  in 
recognition,  so  distinct  and  clear  that  any 
open  eye  can  see  Him,  and  seeing  Him, 
there  is  no  explanation  of  Him  but  the 
one.  He  stands  as  the  one  fulfilled  ideal 
of  humanity.  We  may  pick  out  a  man 
here  and  a  man  there  in  history  or  in  our 
own  knowledge  of  men  as  splendid  speci- 
mens of  some  special  grace  of  human 
nature ; — he  is  brave,  or  he  is  pure,  or  he  is 
generous  or  he  is  unselfish, — but  in  every 
such  instance  there  are  other  graces  un- 
developed and  there  are  faults  and  flaws, 
[27] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
(not  many  perhaps,  and  overshadowed 
by  what  in  him  is  good)  which  lessen 
and  lower  the  value  of  the  character. 
But  the  human  nature  of  the  Master  is 
without  fault  and  without  flaw, — His 
teaching.  His  example,  Himself.  For 
nineteen  centuries  man  after  man  and 
nation  after  nation  has  found  Him  and 
followed  Him,  "  the  chief  est  among  ten 
thousand,  the  altogether  lovely."  If  one 
could  gather  a  collection  of  adjectives 
which  describe  noble  character  and  put 
them  all  in  the  superlative  degree,  it  is 
not  too  much  to  say  that  they  would  come 
short  of  any  real  portraiture  of  Him. 
How  can  we  explain  this  but  on  the 
ground  that  "  He  is  the  word  made  flesh," 
the  utterance,  the  expression,  in  human 
form,  of  God;  the  God  incarnate,  who  is 
the  supreme  revelation,  the  supreme  man- 
ifestation, the  supreme  evidence  of  God. 
[28] 


Evidence 
And  when  one  blurs  the  perfectness 
of  this  humanity  with  a  denial  of  His 
own  claim  to  Godhead,  surely  one  forces 
a  most  vital  inconsistency  upon  his  in- 
telligence and  upon  his  belief.  There 
are  those  who  have  dreamed  nightmares 
of  a  change  in  the  character  of  our  Lord's 
claims  as  to  Himself,  who  have  fondly 
imagined  that  the  God-consciousness  came 
to  Him  at  His  baptism;  that  the  claim  of 
Godhead  as  Son  grew  on  Him,  as  in  later 
life  He  surrendered  Himself  to  some 
subtle  and  mystic  influence  from  the 
fanatical  enthusiasm  of  those  who  fol- 
lowed Him  with  an  exaggerated  love. 
But  sui'ely  they  forget  that  the  later 
period  of  our  Lord's  life  was  fullest  of 
all  that  is  manly  and  magnificent  in  His 
human  nature.  Sm-ely  they  forget  that 
He  suffered  death  upon  the  cross  because 
He  held  to  the  assertion  of  His  God- 
[29] 


Evidence^,  Experience,  Influence 
head,  which  the  Jews  who  condemned 
Him  comited  blasphemy.  Surely  they 
forget  that  the  mastery  of  the  intelli- 
gence, the  aifection,  the  worship  of  the 
civilized  world  came  to  Him  and  has 
grown  and  gathered  more  and  more  about 
Him,  because  of  His  Cross.  Surely  they 
forget  that  the  incontestable  reality  of 
His  resurrection  is  the  clinching  and  con- 
vincing proof  of  the  perfect  humanity 
and  the  entire  divinity  of  Jesus  Christ, — 
very  God  of  very  God,  and  also  very  man, 
— as  the  concentrated  extract  and  the  dis- 
tilled essence  of  ideal  manhood. 

"  First  of  all,"  Dean  Robbins  writes, 
"  there  is  the  moral  elevation  of  Jesus 
Christ  to  be  explained  on  natm'alistic 
grounds.  Shall  we,  or  shall  we  not,  take 
Him  as  our  Master?  Every  instinct  of 
the  heart  prompts  to  the  acknowledg- 
ment of  His  complete  moral  supremacy. 
[30] 


Evidence 
But  how  reconcile  this  supremacy  with 
His  antecedents  and  environments? 
Whence  came  the  cathohcity  of  that 
teaching,  which  never  grows  old  and  never 
disappoints?  How  accomit  for  the  im- 
rivalled  influence  that  He  has  exerted 
over  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men? 
These  questions  press  for  an  answer; 
they  will  not  be  postponed.  No  theory 
of  morals  can  have  any  consistency,  no 
practical  evangel  can  hope  for  effective- 
ness until  the  mind  has  tried  conclusions 
with  this  central  problem,  and  a  defmite 
decision  has  been  reached. 

"  Moreover,  the  character  of  Christ  is 
hopelessly  comphcated,  from  the  rational- 
istic point  of  view,  with  what  must  be 
esteemed  the  most  gigantic  blunder  ever 
made  by  mortal  man — the  claim  which 
He  put  forward  that  He  is  the  Eternal 
Son  of  God.  The  purest  and  highest 
[31] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
character  is  degraded  by  a  blasphemous 
self-assertion  that  finds  parallel  only 
among  the  insane,  and  the  lowest  charla- 
tans who  have  disgraced  religious  history. 
How  has  the  unique  influence  of  Christ 
for  good  maintained  itself,  thus  handi- 
capped? If  Christ  made  no  such  claim, 
how  can  we  disentangle  truth  and  fiction? 
Ai'e  we  not  forced,  in  this  case,  to  ac- 
knowledge that  we  know  practically  noth- 
ing of  Him  from  whom  the  world  has 
derived  its  noblest  inspirations?  " 

Now,  just  as  a  practical  test  of  this 
power  we  may  go  back,  for  instance,  to 
two  points  to  which  I  have  alluded,  the 
verity  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  the 
reality  of  the  signs.  There  is  nowhere 
written  a  clearer  or  a  fuller  statement  of 
the  object,  for  which  the  volume  which 
we  call  the  Bible  was  written  and  has 
been  so  wonderfully  preserved,  as  in  our 
[32] 


Evidence 
Lord's  words  to  the  Jews  of  His  time, 
*'  Ye  search  the  Scriptures."  It  was  a 
word,  not  of  commandment,  but  of  com- 
mendation, and  then  He  added,  "  These 
are  they  that  testify  of  me."  Now 
searching  the  Scriptures  is  rightful  and 
rehgious  work.  Just  now  it  is  so  popu- 
lar as  to  be  almost  fashionable,  and  for 
one  I  believe  that  in  every  direction  of 
searching  it  is  to  be  encouraged,  provided 
only  the  motive  is  right.  The  searching 
with  the  avowed  and  anxious  pui'pose  to 
find  mistakes,  inaccuracies,  contradic- 
tions, the  searching  of  mere  destructive 
criticism,  with  its  spirit  of  bitter  animosity 
has  nothing  to  commend  it,  and  from  it 
nothing  is  to  be  expected.  The  man  who 
starts  out  upon  the  theory  that  the  Bible 
is  to  be  treated  like  any  other  book  avows 
himself  unfitted  for  treating  it  at  all. 
Professor  Sanday,  speaking  at  the  recent 
[33] 


Evidence,  Eccperience,  Influence 
Church  Congress  in  Bristol,  said,  "  The 
critics  are  too  eager  to  make  the  narra- 
tive of  the  Gospels  conform  to  the  con- 
ditions of  other  narratives,  and  to  make 
the  life  described  in  it  conform  to  the 
standard  of  other  lives.  I  do  not  think 
that  there  is  anything,  at  least  in  the 
somider  part  of  modern  historical  meth- 
ods, that  compels  us  to  do  this.  It  is  one 
thing  '  to  read  the  Bible  like  any  other 
book,'  and  another  thing  to  assume  that 
we  shall  only  find  in  it  what  is  found  in 
other  books.  Unique  spiritual  effects  re- 
quire an  unique  spiritual  cause,  and  we 
shall  never  miderstand  the  full  signifi- 
cance of  that  cause  if  we  begin  by  deny- 
ing or  minimizing  its  uniqueness."  The 
searching  of  the  critic  for  technical  study, 
the  searching  for  the  discovery  of  analo- 
gies to  profane  history,  the  searching  for 
scientific  agreement,  the  searching  for 
[34] 


Evidence 
comparative  study  with  the  monumental 
inscriptions,  even  the  searching  for  topo- 
graphical or  botanical  investigations,  is  all 
well  enough,  but  the  true  search  of  the 
Scriptures  is  studying  them  because  they 
testify  of  Christ.  And  one  throws  back 
and  throws  down  the  challenge  with  un- 
hesitating assurance,  from  the  personal- 
ity of  Jesus  Christ  as  we  know  it  in  Him- 
self and  in  His  influence  in  the  world,  to 
the  Scriptures,  to  prove  that  they  are  in- 
herently and  essentially  the  word  of  God, 
because  He  whom  we  have  come  to 
know  stands  imaged  in  them  in  type,  in 
prophecy,  in  biography  and  in  doctrinal 
deduction,  plainly  and  clearly,  and  be- 
cause He  is  true,  we  know  they  must  be 
true. 

The  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's  Cathedral, 
Professor    Bernard,    says,    "  Dissect   the 
Gospels  as  we  will,  we  do  not  get  rid  of 
[35] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
the   supernatural.      Go   back   as   far   as 
analysis  can  lead,  the  central  Figure  re- 
mains greater  than  man.     We  can  say, 
with   more    assurance   than   would   have 
been  legitimate  half  a  century  ago,  that 
the  earliest  extant  records  of  Christ  give 
the  witness  of  those  who  saw  Him,  and 
that  these  represent  Him  as  Divine.     The 
earliest   available   testimony   about   Him 
rests   in   the   confidence   of   His   having 
risen  from  the  dead.     '  The  earliest  nar- 
ratives  of   the   resurrection,'   writes   Dr. 
Schmiedel  himself,  '  arose  simultaneously 
with  the  occurrences  to  which  they  relate.' 
"  Here  is  a  great  gain  indeed.     So  far 
as  the  external  testimony  to  the  Resur- 
rection of  our  Lord  is  concerned,  it  has 
been  strengthened  rather  than  weakened 
by  analysis  of  the  Gospels  and  criticism 
of  the  Epistles.     The  behef  of  this  can- 
not be  represented  as  a  later  accretion  to 
[36] 


Evidence 
the  primitive  faith.  Coeval  with  the 
Apostles,  the  two  great  articles  of  the 
Resurrection  and  the  Virgin  Birth  can 
never  be  acceptable  to,  or  possible  for, 
those  who  cannot  believe  the  Christ  of 
the  Church  to  be  more  than  man.  I  make 
bold  to  say  that  these  two  articles  are  no 
whit  less  credible  than  of  old  to  those  who 
recognize  in  Christ  the  Incarnation  of 
the  Divine;  nor  has  the  criticism  of  the 
Gospels,  while  it  has  affected  many  minor 
beliefs  as  to  our  records  of  Christian 
origins,  done  anything  to  weaken  the 
faith  of  a  Christian  man  in  these  central 
truths." 

Or  take  the  question  of  miracles.  Just 
in  passing  remember  this.  Here  is  a 
man  of  evil  character,  of  wicked  aims  and 
motives,  an  immoral  person.  Here  is  a 
man  upholding  a  cause  which  we  know 
to  be  wrong,  or  a  man  who  is  a  mere 
[37] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
money-maker  and  self-seeker,  and  we  see 
him  do  wonderful  works,  but  because  of 
the  character  of  the  worker,  and  because 
of  the  object  of  their  working  we  know 
that  thc}^  must  be  like  the  wonders  and 
tricks  of  the  charlatan,  marvels  that  can 
be  explained  and  exposed  as  one  sees 
through  a  clever  magician  or  detects  the 
dishonesty  of  so-called  spiritualistic  mani- 
festations. It  really  is  the  way  of  the 
world,  it  is  the  habit  of  intelligent  men, 
not  to  test  a  man  by  miracles,  but  to  test 
the  miracles  by  the  man.  I  am  sick  and 
tired  of  the  average  exploded  description 
of  miracles,  on  account  of  which  objec- 
tions are  made  to  them.  They  are  im- 
possible. As  if  anything  was  impossible 
with  God.  They  are  against  the  law  of 
nature.  As  though  nature  had  fixed  laws 
established  by  a  dead  creator  inside  of  a 
lifeless  machine;  as  though  anything  was 
[38] 


Evidence 
more  disorderly  than  what  we  call  the 
order  of  nature;  as  though  after  one  of 
these  marvellous  manifestations,  like  the 
raising  of  Lazarus,  the  order  of  nature, 
that  all  men  must  die,  did  not  go  on  un- 
changed. They  are  supernatural.  As 
though  we  knew  the  boundaries  of  nature ; 
as  though  in  our  childishness  we  thought 
the  little  receding  horizon  of  our  imper- 
fect vision  was  the  end  of  the  earth;  as 
though  we  did  not  know  that  birds  and 
beasts  and  insects  can  see  and  hear  things 
that  lie  beyond  the  reach  of  our  human 
senses. 

Such  objections  really  refute  them- 
selves. JNIeanwhile  the  character  of 
Jesus  Christ,  His  personality.  His  pur- 
pose vindicated  by  the  accumulating  tes- 
timony of  all  the  centuries,  verifies  as 
true,  as  real,  as  possible,  najy  as  natural 
and  inevitable,  every  sign  that  He 
[39] 


Evidence^,  Experience,  Influence 
showed.  Accept  the  facts  of  His  life, 
(and  if  we  accept  His  life,  we  must  ac- 
cept its  facts,  for  it  is  explicable  in  no 
other  way) — accept  the  facts  of  His  life, 
— ^the  virgin  birth,  for  only  so  could  God 
have  been  made  man,  the  Word  have  been 
made  flesh, — the  death  upon  the  cross  of 
the  Prince  of  Life,  the  very  God,  the 
God-man  submitting  himself  to  die,  so 
that  His  going  out  of  life  is  as  marvellous 
as  His  coming  into  it, — then  the  resurrec- 
tion, in  which  He  who  had  the  power  to 
lay  His  life  down  had  the  power  also,  and 
used  it,  to  take  it  again, — accept  the  fact 
of  Jesus  Christ,  born  and  dying  and  ris- 
ing again,  and  it  is  inevitable  that  from 
such  a  life  should  flow  signs  and  wonders 
as  the  natural  expression  of  such  a  nature. 
Just  as  truly  and  really  as  our  limited 
natures  hold  us  within  certain  bounds,  be- 
yond which  we  cannot  go;  so  truly  and 
[40] 


Evidence 
really  the  unlimited  and  illimitable  nature 
of  the  God-man  makes  not  merely  pos- 
sible, but  natural,  the  exercise  of  those 
illimitable  powers;  and  so  the  man  Christ 
Jesus  proves  and  compels  belief  in  what 
are  called  the  miracles  of  His  earthly  life. 


[41] 


II 

EXPERIENCE 


II 

EXPERIENCE 

I  RECOGNIZE  that  I  am  approach- 
ing in  this  lecture  something  that 
may  well  be  called  "  holy  ground," 
not  to  be  trodden  upon  by  feet  that  are 
shod  with  the  roughness  of  rude  contro- 
versy nor  with  the  irreverence  of  an  idle 
curiosity. 

"  My  inner  religious  life,"  Bishop  Ran- 
dolph says  in  his  Paddock  Lectures,  "  its 
experiences,  its  feelings,  its  deepest  con- 
victions, cannot  be  formulated  into  words 
or  arguments  to  establish  your  faith.  If 
I  could  express  them,  they  might  be 
strange  to  your  experience,  for  feelings 
are  as  variable  as  temperament  or  asso- 
[45] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
ciations.  Wesley,  in  his  later  years, 
seems  to  have  had  some  doubt  about  '  Ex- 
perience Meetings  '  as  a  means  for  pro- 
moting and  deepening  spiritual  life,  and 
endeavored  to  confine  them  to  an  ex- 
change of  sympathies  in  its  duties  and 
its  daily  habits. 

"  I  can  give  my  reasons  for  believing 
in  God,  for  my  faith  in  Christ  from  every 
field  of  knowledge,  from  every  source  of 
evidence  addressed  to  thinking  beings. 
But  behind  and  deeper  than  these  exoteric 
reasons,  there  are  esoteric  convictions 
which  are  untranslatable  into  words.  The 
sources  are  too  secret  and  the  realities  are 
too  spiritual,  too  subtle,  too  sacred  to 
tell." 

We  are  driven  in  upon  ourselves  from 

time  to  time  to  find  some  assurance  of 

our  religious  position.     I  have  dealt  with 

the  question  of  evidence  from  the  out- 

[46] 


Expejience 
side,  and  I  am  calling  this  rather  experi- 
ence than  any  other  name,  meaning  the 
interior  assurance  which  a  man  may  have 
whether    he    is    really    religious    or    not. 
Sometimes    the    need    of    this    assurance 
arises  from  the  presence  of  some  great 
mystery    which    comes    to    ourselves    or 
which  we  see  or  know  in  the  lives  of  other 
people.     Sometimes  it  lies  in  the   form 
of  some  tremendous  temptation.     Some- 
times   it    is    due    to    the    intrusion    into 
our   minds   of   doubt.     But   from  what- 
ever  source   it   comes,    it   needs   looking 
at  and  looking  into.     There  is  of  com-se 
a    prevalent    and    easy    assurance    which 
contents    us    at    ordinary    times,    in    the 
frequency  and  regularity  of  our  use  of 
the  ordered  and  outward  acts  of  religion, 
— the    habit    of    saying    prayers,    which 
may  not  be  praying;  the  habit  of  read- 
ing the   Bible,   which  may  not   be   get- 
[47] 


Evidence^  Experience^  Influence 
ting  a  message  from  God's  word;  the 
habit  of  coming  to  church,  which  may  not 
be  worshipping;  the  habit  of  Holy  Com- 
mmiion,  which  may  not  be  discerning  the 
Lord's  body.  Now  and  then  there  must 
be  some  stirring  and  searching  in  our  use 
of  these  means  to  see  if  there  is  in  them 
the  power  of  purpose  and  desire  and  faith. 
More  dangerous  is  the  easy  assurance  of 
one  who  is  content  with  the  mere  nega- 
tive avoidance  of  forbidden  things,  the 
living  of  what  is  called  a  moral  life,  for- 
getting that  life  is  made  up  of  positive 
duties  and  not  merely  of  avoided  sins, 
and  forgetting  the  need  of  active  obedi- 
ence to  the  law  filled  full  of  the  new  mean- 
ing and  the  new  motive  of  life.  It  was 
said  to  the  men  of  old  time,  "  Thou  shalt 
not  kill."  It  is  said  to  us  in  the  new 
time  of  Christ,  "  He  that  hateth  his 
brother  is  a  murderer,"  And  there  is 
[48] 


Experience 
still  another  facile  and  superficial  tem- 
peramental test;  careless  about  the  life 
and  indifferent  to  the  observance  of  what 
are  called  the  demands  of  institutional 
Christianity,  quite  apart  from  morality, 
not  often  accompanied  by  immoralness, 
floating  in  a  thin  solution  of  sentiment 
and  emotion,  which  calls  itself  love  of 
God,  but  lacks  the  instinct  of  love,  which 
is  conformity  to  the  will  of  the  beloved. 
But  somehow  or  other  into  every  real  life 
there  must  come  something  deeper  and 
truer  than  all  this, — a  real  experience  of 
religion.  I  am  almost  afraid  to  use  the 
word  "  conversion  "  lest  I  should  seem  to 
give  any  warrant  to  the  false  and  dan- 
gerous notions  that  pertain  about  the  con- 
verted life;  and  yet  the  question  of  ex- 
perience begins  and  centres  in  this  tre- 
mendous fact  of  every  real  life. 

Mr.  Eugene   Stock,  in  describing  an 
[49] 


Evidence:,  Experience,  Influence 
address  which  he  made  to  some  EngHsh- 
speaking  Hindus  in  India,  puts  very 
strongly  the  relation  of  experience  to  evi- 
dence. "  I  used  the  old  and  simple  illus- 
tration of  the  three  kinds  of  evidence — 
historical,  internal,  experimental.  You 
send  a  boy  to  the  druggist's  shop  to  buy 
some  phosphorus.  In  due  course  he  re- 
turns and  hands  you  a  little  packet.  He 
tells  you  how  he  went  to  the  shop,  how 
he  asked  for  phosphorus,  how  the  shop- 
man said  '  Yes,'  and  gave  him  this  packet ; 
that  is  the  historical  evidence.  You  open 
the  packet ;  the  substance  within  looks  and 
smells  hke  phosphorus ;  that  is  the  internal 
evidence.  Have  you  still  any  doubt  what 
it  is?  Set  it  alight!  see  how  it  burns! 
That  is  the  experimental  evidence.  I  as- 
sured my  Hindu  audience  that  I  for  one 
considered  we  had  ample  historical  and 
internal  evidence  to  the  truth  and  author- 
[50] 


Experience 
ity  of  God's  one  revelation  as  contained 
in  the  Scriptures;  while  I  acknowledged 
that  this  evidence  might  fairly  be  debated 
by  reasonable  men.  But  the  experi- 
mental evidence  of  Christianity — how  ob- 
tain that?  Try  it  every  man  for  himself. 
Taste  and  see!  " 

I  confess  that  many  things  have  forced 
this  thought  upon  me  this  year, — the 
Wesleyan  centenary  and  the  revival  of 
interest  in  that  extraordinary  life;  a  book 
of  strange  and  startling  suggestiveness, 
attractive,  here  and  there  repellent,  the 
Life  of  Gipsy  Smith;  the  account  which 
comes  freshly  to  me  this  year  of  the  power 
and  peace  of  a  Sunday  service  at  North- 
field;  and  then,  the  statement,  which  I 
know  to  be  true,  of  a  most  devoted  and 
able  priest  of  this  Church,  who  came  to 
what  he  believed  to  be  a  real  conversion, 
after  he  had  professed  the  Christian  life 
[51] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
and  been  active  and  earnest  in  the  Chris- 
tian ministry,  in  and  during  and  by  means 
of  the  singing  of  the  hymn,  "  Just  as  I 
am  without  one  plea."  We  are  too  much 
in  the  habit,  in  our  communion,  of  ignor- 
ing the  whole  fact  and  teaching  of  con- 
version, which  is  part  at  least  of  the  ex- 
perience of  the  religious  life.  It  has 
been,  let  us  grant  it,  associated  in  our 
minds  with  people  and  with  incidents 
most  unattractive  to  our  tastes,  most  an- 
tagonistic to  our  methods  and  habits  of 
thought  and  life  and  worship.  Have  we 
not  carried  this  feeling  too  far?  Have 
we  not  condemned  the  reality  because  we 
have  distrusted  and  disliked  some  of  its 
manifestations?  Our  Lord  has  used  the 
expression  and  given  us  the  illustration  of 
its  meaning  in  His  memorable  words 
"  except  ye  be  converted  and  become  as 
little  children,  ye  shall  not  enter  into  the 
[52] 


kingdom  of  heaven."  Always  it  seems  to 
me  that  this  utterance  of  our  Lord  stands 
side  by  side  with  the  expression  similar 
and  yet  diverse  from  this,  "  except  a  man 
be  born  again,  he  cannot.''  That  is  a  law 
in  the  spiritual  life.  It  refers,  I  believe, 
to  the  earthly  entrance  into  God's  earthly 
kingdom,  the  Church,  whose  only  door  is 
that  birth  "of  water  and  the  spirit,"  not  of 
water  and  of  the  spirit,  but  with  the  sin- 
gle preposition  which  implies  that  the  two 
are  inseparably  united  to  make  one  in- 
strument, e^vSaros  Acat  Trveujaaro?.  It  is  a 
question  of  what  can  or  cannot  be.  It 
is  of  the  nature  of  the  case.  But  this 
other  is  the  revelation  of  the  will  of  the 
King.  It  is  the  utterance  of  a  law  of  the 
kingdom.  And  as  it  refers  not  to  the 
outer  sign  of  citizenship,  but  to  the  inner 
mark  of  character,  it  applies  to  the  final 
admission  into  the  completed  and  con- 
[53] 


Evidence,  Eocperience,  Influence 
summated  kingdom.  "  Except  ye  turn," 
the  revisers  put  it,  perhaps  more  accu- 
rately, but  not  exclusively  of  the  other 
expression,  "  except  ye  be  converted." 
Of  course  it  does  not  mean  that  strange 
delusion  that  a  man  may  sit  still  and  wait 
and  wonder  and  do  nothing,  until  some- 
thing comes  from  outside  and  acts  upon 
him,  as  though  the  whole  operation  was 
external  to  the  man.  And  yet,  not  "  ex- 
cept ye  turn  "  as  though  the  whole  action 
were  an  individual  act  and  an  unaided 
effort.  I  like  the  words  that  begin  with 
"  con  "  in  the  spiritual  life, — confess,  con- 
firm, conform,  conscience,  convert  and  the 
like, — because  they  mean  co-operation, 
the  spirit  of  God  and  the  will  of  a  man. 
"  Work  out  your  own  salvation  because 
it  is  God  that  worketh  in  you."  The 
spirit  of  son-making,  whereby  we  cry 
"  Abba,  Father."  And  so,  while  conver- 
[54] 


Eicperience 
sion  means  turning  as  well  as  being 
turned,  while  there  is  no  being  turned  ex- 
cept as  one  turns,  while  turning  must  be 
the  act  of  the  individual  soul  under  the 
power  of  the  spirit  of  God,  we  will  use 
this  word  "  conversion "  in  this  sense, 
"  except  ye  be  converted." 

I  am  free  to  say  that  I  think  no  man  can 
dare  to  set  himself  against  even  the  most 
astounding  statements  of  individual  or 
collective  conversions,  lest  "  hapty  he  be 
found  to  fight  against  God."  I  am  free 
to  say  that  no  man  of  quick  and  keen  sen- 
sibility to  reUgious  influences  and  impres- 
sions can  dare  to  mark  as  unconverted,  a 
man  who  has  never  experienced  the  sensa- 
tions that  he  himself  has  felt.  And  I  am 
as  free  to  say  that  no  man  of  cold  and  in- 
expressive nature  can  dare  to  question  the 
reality  of  the  conversion  of  a  man,  whose 
sensations  he  has  no  power  to  imagine  or 
[55] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
to  feel.  And  again  I  say,  lest  "  haply 
he  be  found  to  fight  against  God." 
There  is  only  one  thing  of  which  I  am 
absolutely  sure,  that  there  never  was  and 
never  can  be  the  instantaneous  and  per- 
manent change  by  conversion,  of  a  sinner 
into  a  completed  saint.  One  may  believe 
in  the  quick  sprouting  of  a  seed  out  of 
congenial  soil  and  under  a  genial  sun  into 
the  fair  promise  of  a  strong  shoot,  but 
after  that,  before  the  flowering  and  the 
fruitage,  there  must  be  gradual  growth. 
So  we  are  ready,  I  think,  to  study  out 
this  grave  and  vital  question  of  conver- 
sion, of  experience,  as  our  Lord  has  taught 
it  in  connection  with  these  words.  "  Ex- 
cept ye  be  converted  and  become  as  lit- 
tle children  ye  shall  not  enter  into  the 
kingdom."  And  first  of  all,  let  us  re- 
member that  the  words  are  spoken  to 
disciples.  Jews  and  Turks  and  infidels, 
[56] 


Ea^perience 
these  need  conversion  and  we  pray  for 
them;  and  people  of  evil  lives,  drunk- 
ards and  adulterers  and  blasphemers, — 
and  so  we  work  in  the  slums  and  we  send 
missionaries  to  the  heathen;  but  disciples? 
you  and  I?  yes,  over  and  over  and  over 
again.  Wherever  there  has  been  a  turn- 
ing aside  there  must  be  a  turning  back. 
After  every  lapse  into  sin  there  must  be 
conversion,  not  the  feeling,  but  the  fact. 
And  morning  after  morning  and  night 
after  night,  in  the  waywardness  and  the 
wilfulness  and  the  carelessness  of  our 
lives,  the  cry  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  ring- 
ing in  our  ears,  "  Turn  ye,  turn  ye,  why 
will  ye  die? "  In  one  sense  conversion  is 
not  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  life, 
because  the  little  child  that  is  born  of 
water  and  the  Holy  Spirit  is  in  the  king- 
dom of  God.  Perhaps  it  is  more  safe  to 
say,  since  the  meaning  and  the  power  of 
[57] 


Evidence^  Experience^  Influence 
that  baptismal  gift  is  faint  and  far  away 
in  some  of  us,  conversion  is  not  neces- 
sarily the  beginning  of  the  Christian  Hfe. 
But  over  and  over  again  it  is  the  re- 
newal, the  refreshment,  the  restoration  of 
that  which,  but  for  this  gracious  possi- 
bility, would  be  the  lost  opportunity  of 
the  soul. 

And  then  the  test  of  it  and  the  proof 
of  it.  It  is  a  little  child  that  Jesus  takes 
and  sets  in  the  midst  of  the  disciples,  and 
makes  the  aim  and  the  ambition  of  their 
lives  and  the  test  of  their  conversion. 
Apparently  men  have  misunderstood  un- 
til they  have  perverted  this  lesson,  mis- 
taking childishness  for  childlikeness ;  as 
though  one  would  dare  to  let  the  senile 
helplessness  of  second  childhood  stand  as 
representing  the  maturer  attainments  of 
completed  manhood.  We  certainly  put 
childishness  for  childlikeness  in  our  prac- 
[58] 


Experience 
tical  application  of  this  thought,  for  child- 
hood has  its  graces  and  its  disgraces,  and 
we  mistake  the  one  for  the  other.  Our 
lives  are  childish  in  that  they  are  trifling 
and  frivolous,  with  no  sense  of  responsi- 
biUty,  lived  for  mere  amusement  and  en- 
joyment. That  is  the  childish  life. 
Whereas  the  graces  of  childhood  are  not 
easy  to  get  or  to  keep  in  the  rush  and  race 
of  life ;  for  a  little  child  is  simple  and  seri- 
ous and  aiFectionate  and  grateful  and  de- 
pendent and  humble  and  pure.  And  the 
graces  and  marks  of  childhood  really  are 
the  fairest  ornaments  of  manhood  or 
womanhood  in  their  maturity.  Alas, 
there  is  one  element  of  childhood  to  which 
manhood  can  never  come.  It  is  inno- 
cence. But  penitence  and  pardon  can 
give  purity,  so  that  in  the  language  of  one 
of  the  most  perfect  of  the  Collects  "  God's 
faithful  people,  being  granted  pardon 
[59] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
and  peace,  can  serve  Him  with  a  quiet 
mind." 

And  of  these  graces  of  childhood  the 
one  which  our  Lord  selects  as  the  special 
test  and  token  is  humility.  Rather,  it  is 
the  act  and  habit  of  self-humiliation, — 
"  Whosoever  shall  humble  himself."  Let 
us  face  this  as  the  test  of  a  real  religious 
experience,  as  the  evidence  of  a  religion 
that  has  taken  hold  of  our  natures,  as  the 
indication  of  what  religion  really  is  in  the 
life.  It  is  neither  right  nor  safe  to  be 
making  comparisons  among  sins,  as  to 
which  is  more  and  which  less  deadly  and 
destructive.  But  surely  prominent  among 
the  evil  tendencies  of  human  nature  is  the 
sin  of  pride.  Prominent  and  most  bane- 
ful, because  it  hardens  the  heart  against 
God  and  against  man.  There  is  no  open 
way  of  access  by  which  God  can  reach  a 
man,  and  there  is  no  sense  of  the  need 
[60] 


Experience 
of  a  way  by  which  a  man  can  approach 
God,  while  the  soul  is  filled  with  the  pride 
of  self-sufficiency.  If  it  is  pride  of  in- 
tellect, then  it  will  resist  the  whole  thought 
of  any  need  of  revelation,  confident  of 
having  power  to  know  all  that  needs  to 
be  known.  If  it  is  pride  of  possessions, 
then  it  will  satisfy  the  soul  with  that  dra- 
matic utterance  of  the  rich  fool, — "  Soul, 
take  thine  ease," — and  there  will  be  no 
craving  and  no  cultivation  of  any  craving, 
for  the  riches  and  fruition  of  the  life 
eternal.  And  as  it  shapes  life  in  relation 
to  other  men,  pride  breeds  the  contemptu- 
ous sense  of  superiority  and  the  selfish 
withdrawal  from  all  needs  and  interests 
except  its  own.  It  was  the  root  sin  of 
Satan.  And  whatever  form  it  takes, 
pride  of  opinion,  pride  of  social  place, 
pride  of  power,  pride  of  race,  the  vulgar 
pride  of  wealth  or  the  petty  pride  of 
[61] 


Evidence^  Experience^  Influence 
vanity  in  beauty,  it  is  the  hardest  hardener 
of  hearts.  Nor  may  we  forget  that  it  is 
so  common  a  tendency  as  to  show  itself 
in  most  unHkely  places,  in  people  whom 
our  proudness  looks  down  upon  as  having 
nothing  to  be  proud  of.  No  wonder  that 
our  Lord  puts  self-humiliation  first  as  the 
evidence  of  conversion,  as  the  test  of  any 
real  experience  of  religion.  We  have 
peculiar  racial  temptations  in  this  direc- 
tion. I  say  racial,  because  it  runs  in  our 
English  blood  to  feel  that  somehow  there 
has  been  given  to  us  a  place  among  the 
nations  of  the  earth  which  means  the 
supremacy  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race;  and 
our  modern  Americanism  emphasizes  and 
intensifies  this  tendency,  in  the  boastful- 
ness  with  which  we  are  tempted  to  meas- 
ure everything  by  size,  just  the  mere  big- 
ness of  territorial  extent,  or  numbers  of 
population,  or  value  of  imports  and  ex- 
[62] 


Experience 
ports,  or  growth  in  material  things.  The 
cure  for  the  race  and  for  the  nation  is  in 
the  humihation  of  the  sense  of  our  short- 
comings, with  our  great  responsibihty  for 
all  these  gifts  and  powers.  And  indi- 
vidually the  two  chief  collective  influences 
are  first,  the  insistent  comparing  of  each 
man's  self  with  the  one  ideal  and  example, 
namely,  the  perfect  humanity  of  Jesus 
Christ;  and  then,  the  constant  comparison 
of  ourselves  as  we  are,  with  the  selves  we 
might  have  been  had  we  been  faithful  to 
our  graces  and  our  gifts.  Put  side  by 
side  the  great  apostle's  estimate  of  him- 
self,— "  Christ  Jesus  came  into  the  world 
to  save  sinners,  of  which  I  am  chief," — 
with  the  Pharisee's  estimate,  gained  by 
manufacturing  in  his  mind's  eye  a  con- 
temptible creature  in  the  shape  of  the 
Pubhcan  as  he  rated  him, — "  I  thank 
God  that  I  am  not  as  other  men  are,  or 
[63] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
even  as  this  Publican."  Real  humility, 
real  self -humbling,  not  false  modesty,  not 
vulgar  self -depreciation,  but  the  tram- 
pling down  of  the  fatal  possession  of 
pride,  is  the  supremest  evidence  and  the 
most  sure  experience  of  religion  in  the 
character  and  life.  I  cannot  think  that 
it  is  matter  of  accident  that  in  this  18th 
chapter  of  St.  Matthew's  Gospel,  which 
contains  this  teaching  of  conversion,  our 
Lord  has  used  perhaps  the  very  most  in- 
tense expression  of  effort  and  energy  that 
can  be  found  in  all  His  teachings.  Here 
is  the  disciple  seeking  conversion,  seek- 
ing childlikeness,  seeking  self-humiliation, 
and  the  hand  or  the  foot  that  offends  is 
to  be  cut  off  and  cast  away,  and  the  eye 
that  offends  is  to  be  plucked  out, — the 
hand  of  covetousness,  the  hand  of  cruelty, 
the  hand  of  dishonesty;  the  foot  that 
strays  into  the  way  of  forbidden  pleas- 
[64] 


Experience 
ures,  the  foot  that  errs  from  the  path 
of  God's  commandments,  the  foot  that 
makes  haste  to  do  evil ;  the  eye  that  envies, 
the  eye  that  bhnds  itself  to  truth,  the  eye 
that  wanders,  the  eye  that  lusts.  And 
the  lesson  lies  for  us,  who  would  have  the 
evidence,  the  experience,  the  assurance  of 
rehgion,  that  it  is  not  an  easy  attainment 
once  for  all  secured,  but  a  long  and  con- 
stant conflict  with  our  natui'es,  the  real 
battle  of  life,  to  be  won  only  at  the  cost 
of  self-denial  and  self-mastery,  slowly 
and  gradually,  "  until  the  breaking  of  the 
day." 

The  somewhat  strange  and  startling  in- 
troduction into  this  chapter  of  the  elev- 
enth verse  (which  Lachmann  and  Tisch- 
endorf  and  Tregelles  omit),  belongs  here 
it  seems  to  me,  or  has,  at  least,  suggestive 
connection  with  our  Lord's  teaching 
here,  because  it  sets  before  us  at  once  the 
[65] 


Evidence,  Eocperience,  Influence 
great  need  and  the  great  hope  of  every 
life.  The  great  need,  in  that  it  recalls 
the  teaching  of  our  Lord  of  the  won- 
derful threefold  parable  of  penitence. 
Whatever  may  be  the  step  or  stage  of 
wandering  from  Him,  the  foolish  stray- 
ing of  the  sheep,  the  suUen  self -separa- 
tion of  the  coin,  the  remote  self -exile  of 
the  boy,  each  one  is  lost.  It  is  a  hard 
word  and  a  strong  one,  telling  the  actual 
result  of  every  unrepented  sin.  Each  one 
is  lost,  absolutely  and  equally,  until  it  is 
found,  forgiven,  restored  to  the  fold,  to 
the  hoard,  to  the  home.  And  then  the 
great  hope :  for  over  against  the  otherwise 
intolerable  awfulness  of  this  declaration, 
it  paints  the  patient  and  perpetual  seek- 
ing of  the  Son  of  Man  for  every  least 
lost  thing,  for  every  one  lost  thing,  for 
everything  so  little  lost  or  so  very  far 
away,  to  whose  seeking  the  love  of  the 
[661 


Eojperience 
Son  of  Man  sets  no  limit  of  time  or  place, 
for  it  is  written  that  "  He  seeks  mitil  He 
finds."  And  the  evidence  of  experience 
within  each  one  for  his  own  assm-ance,  and 
going  out  from  each  one  for  its  influence 
upon  others,  the  evidence  of  experience 
is  that  the  lost  is  found,  the  penny  re- 
stored to  the  frugal  store,  the  sheep  re- 
turned to  the  fold,  the  boy  brought  home. 


[67] 


Ill 

INFLUENCE 


Ill 

INFLUENCE 

IF  I  have  seemed  to  stray  somewhat 
remotely  from  the  assigned  subjects 
of  these  lectures,  which  are  to  deal 
with  the  evidences  of  natural  and  revealed 
religion,  I  hope  that  I  may  gather  up  into 
the  teaching  of  this  last  lecture,  the  two 
lines  of  thought  on  evidence  and  experi- 
ence, the  inner  and  the  outer  evidence, 
really,  into  an  examination  of  the  evi- 
dence, as  it  shows  itself  in  character,  of 
religion  fii-st  natural  and  then  revealed; 
and  then  the  evidences,  in  effect  and  in- 
fluence upon  character,  of  the  various  re- 
ligions, as  they  are  called,  which  have 
sprung  from  some  purely  human  origin. 
[71] 


Evidence,  JEocperience,  Influence 
I  am  quite  aware  that  I  am  not  using 
these  words  in  the  sense  in  which  Bishop 
Butler  has  immortahzed  them  in  his  in- 
comparable Analogy,  wherein  he  develops 
the  great  thought  that  the  "  chief  objec- 
tions, equally  untenable  in  either  instance, 
toward  the  truth  and  the  proof  of  the 
moral  and  Christian  dispensation  as  re- 
vealed to  us,  lie  equally  against  what  is 
experienced  in  the  constitution  and  order 
of  nature  and  Providence."  Studied 
along  the  line  of  this  analogy,  the  evi- 
dence which  natural  religion  gives  to  the 
truth  of  revelation  is  marvellous  indeed. 
I  am  using  the  word  rather  to  mean  the 
religion  of  nature  as  it  manifests  itself 
in  the  history  of  the  peoples  to  whom  no 
direct  revelation  of  God  has  yet  come. 
We  are  in  the  habit  of  judging  harshly 
and  severely  the  morahty  of  the  Hebrew 
people  in  the  time  of  Moses,  for  instance, 
[72] 


Influence 
because  we  are  always  contrasting  them 
with  Christian  standards ;  but  the  true  con- 
trast is  between  them  and  the  character, 
morahty,  belief  and  worship  of  the  other 
contemporary  nations  of  the  world.  And 
if  one  studies  the  story  of  the  heathen, 
their  cruelty,  their  superstition,  their  un- 
bridled lust,  their  incessant  wars,  their 
treatment  of  captives,  their  treatment  of 
women, — none  of  them  destitute  of  some 
form  of  religion,  some  recognition  of  a 
superior  and  unseen  power,  something 
that  they  call  worship, — one  gets  the  evi- 
dence of  the  character  of  these  religions 
of  nature  and  of  their  effect  on  character, 
and  reahzes  its  low  morality,  its  degrada- 
tion of  human  nature,  its  surrender 
to  passion,  its  absolute  animalness,  with 
hardly  an  uplift  above  the  so-called  brute 
creation,  its  material  conceptions  even 
of  life  after  death  (for  the  instinctive  im- 
[73] 


Evidence^  Experience^  Influence 
pression  of  immortality  exists  even  in  the 
most  degraded  people),  its  hmiian  sac- 
rifices, its  cannibalism  (explained  and  de- 
fended on  religious  principles  that  the 
best  must  be  sacrificed  to  the  gods,  and 
that  the  virtue  of  the  great  chief  slain 
and  eaten  was  imparted  in  this  way  to 
the  captors),  and  their  only  and  entire 
appeal  to  the  baser  element  of  fear. 
Surely  judged  by  such  results,  the  power 
of  the  religion  is  self -condemned.  No 
one  who  is  familiar  with  the  here  and  there 
glimpse  which  the  historical  portions  of 
the  Old  Testament  give  of  the  habits  and 
beliefs  and  practices,  for  instance  of  the 
heathen  nations  of  Canaan  or  of  the  peo- 
ple of  Sodom,  or  of  the  ancient  Egyp- 
tians (highest  of  all  peoples  except  the 
Hebrews  in  their  intellectual  elevation), 
no  one  can  doubt  the  evidence  that  the 
influence  upon  character  of  the  religions 
[74] 


Influence 
of  nature  never  lifted  man  to  any  develop- 
ment of  the  nobler  elements  of  himself. 
They  rather  dragged  down  God  to  their 
own  lower  levels.  So  that  the  argmnent 
lies  not  only  from  analogy  to  the  proba- 
bility of  the  Christian  revelation,  but  from 
contrast,  to  the  immeasurable  superiority 
of  the  religion  of  Jesus  Christ;  and  even 
before  that,  to  the  infinitely  higher  devel- 
opment, through  the  imperfect  and  pro- 
gressive revelation  which  led  up  to  the 
full  manifestation  of  God's  will  and 
God's  truth,  when  the  law,  like  a  school- 
master, a  pedagogue,  was  slowly  leading 
the  world  on  and  up  to  Christ. 

There  is  another  open  page  which  lies 
before  the  student  of  history  in  the  con- 
dition of  things  in  Greece  and  Rome  dur- 
ing the  very  height  of  what  is  called 
their  civilization.  We  remember  that  St. 
Paul  described  the  Athenians  of  his  day 
[75] 


Evidence,  Eocperience,  Influence 
as  a  more  than  usually  God-fearing  peo- 
ple. The  Acropolis  bristled  with  altars. 
The  chief  feasts  of  the  people  were  con- 
nected with  their  religious  ceremonies. 
Processions  in  honor  of  the  Gods  were 
the  most  splendid  and  magnificent  and 
the  most  popular  of  all  the  holiday  keep- 
ings. They  named  the  days  of  the  week 
after  the  deities;  and  the  great  games, 
which  have  become  historic  in  connection 
with  the  famous  tragedies  of  classic  litera- 
ture, had  all  rehgious  elements  at  their 
foundation.  This  is  true  of  pagan  Rome. 
So  far  as  superstition  is  a  token  of  re- 
ligious belief, — and  while  religion  need 
not  and  must  not  be  superstition,  supersti- 
tion has  always  a  religious  foundation, 
— they  lived  their  daily  lives,  hour  by 
hour,  and  act  by  act,  under  its  direction. 
The  calendar  of  gods  and  deified  heroes 
ran  over  every  day  of  every  year.  And 
[76] 


Influence 
somewhat  after  the  fashion  of  impagan 
Rome  in  its  canonization  of  saints,  they 
filled  any  vacancies  that  might  be,  by  the 
apotheosis  of  an  emj)eror,  an  athlete  or 
a  soldier.     And  their  literature  is  rich  in 
dreams  and  imaginings  of  an  immortal 
life,  material,  sensuous,  earthy,  but  still 
a  Ufe  after  death  and  beyond  the  grave. 
And  yet  when  one  comes  to  know  how 
their  very  religion  was  gross  with  licen- 
tiousness and  impurity,  how  they  deified 
lust  and  invented  a  god  of  drunkenness, 
how  the  orgies  of  the  Saturnalia  and  the 
Bacchanalia  were  too  disgusting  even  to 
read  or  to  recall,  the  evidence  of  such  a 
religion  is  a  protest  against  its  desecration 
of  the  name.     And  underneath  this  and 
because  of  this,  what  is  the  evidence  of 
its  influence  upon  their  lives?     When  the 
thin  veneer  of  the  boasted  civilization  of 
Greece  and  Rome  is  peeled  off,  when  one 
[77] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
has  looked  under  and  into  the  exquisite 
grace  and  beauty  of  their  art,  the  splen- 
did monuments  of  their  architecture,  and 
the  polish  and  wealth  of  their  literature, 
one  comes  upon  a  condition,  not  of  morals, 
but  of  recognized,  tolerated,  universal 
immorality  passing  comprehension  and 
refusing  to  be  described, — the  human 
slavery,  the  exposure  of  children,  the 
degradation  of  women,  cruelty  to  animals, 
gluttony,  drunkenness,  unbridled  passion, 
extravagance  of  expenditure  for  display, 
for  luxury,  for  pandering  to  appetite, 
until  it  fills  out  the  Master's  description 
of  the  sepulchres  that  were  beautiful  out- 
side, but  within  were  filled  "  with  dead 
men's  bones  and  all  uncleanness."  Surely 
the  evidence  of  the  influence  of  such  a 
religion  upon  life  is  its  own  condemna- 
tion. 

It  is  more  perhaps  to  the  point,  because 
[78] 


Influence 
it  enters  much  into  the  popular  talk  of 
our  day,  to  look  at  and  to  look  into  the  evi- 
dence of  the  influence  upon  life  and  char- 
acter, of  the  religions  other  than  Chris- 
tianity which  still  hold  sway  over  large 
populations  of  the  world.  That  almost 
sacrilegious  parody  which  was  enacted 
at  a  World's  Fair,  called  the  Parliament 
of  Religions,  undertook  to  set  forth  as 
part  of  its  entertainment,  the  beauty  and 
value  of  Buddhism  and  Brahminism  and 
the  rest;  and  in  that  strange  combination 
of  cults  and  views  which  pertains  in  Bos- 
ton, a  distinguished  representative  of  the 
Chinese  nation  boldly  proclaimed  the  vast 
superiority  of  Confucianism  to  Christian- 
ity. I  remember  very  well  hearing  Phil- 
lips Brooks,  when  he  came  back  from 
India,  say  virtually  that  the  worst  condi- 
tions of  life  in  a  Christian  land  were  better 
than  the  highest  attainments  of  the  relig- 
[79] 


Evidence^  Eocperience,  Influence 
ions  of  the  East.  Aiid  just  because  of 
the  passing  fashion  which  has  exalted  into 
dignity  the  esoteric  doctrines  of  Buddha, 
and  has  proclaimed  Nirvana  as  a  very  high 
attainment  of  character,  and  circulates 
and  reads  with  great  admiration  the  Ht- 
erature  of  eastern  religions,  it  is  well,  I 
think,  to  look  at  the  evidence  of  non- 
christian  religions  and  to  know  just  what 
human  life  and  character,  in  their  aims 
and  their  results,  are,  under  their  influence. 
It  is,  alas,  true,  that  in  the  shortcomings 
of  our  Christian  lives  there  exist  condi- 
tions that  reproduce  these  evils;  but  it  is 
always  to  be  remembered  that  with  us 
such  lives  are  against  and  in  spite  of  our 
religion,  and  with  them  they  are  the  out- 
come and  result  of  their  religious  teach- 
ing. 

One  may  not  forget  the  great  example 
of  St.  Paul  in  approaching  a  non-chris- 
[80] 


Influence 
tian  religious  system,  to  try  first  to  find 
and  recognize  in  it  some  common  point 
of  contact,  from  which  to  lead  on  and  up 
to  the  higher  and  better  teachings  of 
Christianity.  As  Mr.  Speer  states  it, 
"  There  is  nothing  good  in  them  that  is 
not  in  Christianity.  They  are  not  wholly 
bad.  In  each  one  of  the  great  religions 
some  vital  truth  is  emphasized:  the  sover- 
eignty of  God  in  ^lohammedanism,  the 
divine  immanence  in  Hinduism,  human 
submission  and  gentleness  in  Buddhism, 
filial  piety  and  political  order  in  Confu- 
cianism, patriotism  in  Shintoism,  the 
spirituality  of  nature  in  Shamanism — 
these  are  great  and  valuable  truths."  To 
which  he  also  wisely  adds,  "  These  truths 
are  held  in  distortion,  unbalanced  by 
needed  counter-truths.  The  Moslem  holds 
the  doctrine  of  divine  sovereignty  so  one- 
sidedly  that  he  gives  up  all  hope  of  prog- 
[81] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
ress,  loses  all  sense  of  personal  responsi- 
bility for  the  change  of  evil  conditions, 
and  answers  every  appeal  for  energetic 
effort  by  the  resigned  protest,  *  It  is  the 
will  of  God.'  The  Hindu  holds  the  doc- 
trine of  divine  immanence  in  so  loose  and 
unguarded  a  form  that  it  becomes  a  cover 
for  utter  antinomianism.  The  man  is  his 
own  god.  The  horrible  immorality  of 
much  Hindu  worship  is  the  legitimate  re- 
sult of  the  pantheistic  development  of  the 
Hindu  doctrine  of  inmianent  deity.  The 
Buddhists  teach  submission  without  its 
needed  counter-checks,  and  listlessness 
and  Nirvana  even  now  brood  over  the 
Buddhist  peoples.  Confucianism  teaches 
the  ethics  of  a  present  life,  and  forgets 
that  there  is  a  life  to  come.  Shintoism 
exalts  loyalty  to  country  and  master,  and 
goes  to  the  extreme  of  subordinating  to 
such  loyalty  the  moral  law.  Shamanism 
[82] 


Influence 
makes  every  bush  the  house  of  God,  and 
propitiates  Him  by  adorning  His  house 
with  rags  or  old  shoes.  The  religion 
whose  God  is  not  above  its  bushes  as  well 
as  in  its  bushes  can  do  no  better."  To 
carry  on  the  arraignment  let  me  add  that 
Mohammedanism  commands  the  murder 
of  unbelievers  who  will  not  embrace  Islam 
and  pay  tribute,  and  of  every  apostate 
from  Islam.  It  allows  slavery  and  polyg- 
amy and  concubinage  and  justifies  war  as 
a  means  of  promoting  religion.  Hindu- 
ism, by  the  character  of  the  gods,  by  the 
teaching  of  the  sacred  books,  by  the  na- 
ture of  much  of  the  temple  worship,  fos- 
ters uncleanness  and  sanctions  immoral- 
ity. Buddhism  promotes  indolence  and 
dignifies  mendicancy  and  degrades  wom- 
anhood, teaching  that  the  only  hope  of 
heaven  for  a  woman  must  be  some  trans- 
migration to  be  born  a  man.  And  compe- 
[83] 


Evidence^  Experience,  Influence 
tent  scholars  living  in  the  East  and  know- 
ing its  so-called  sacred  books,  bear  witness 
to  the  fact  that  many  of  them  are  "  in- 
capable of  translation  for  vileness,"  that 
the  priesthood  of  Hinduism  is  the  main- 
stay of  every  unholy,  immoral  and  cruel 
custom  and  superstition,  and  that  the 
shrines  and  endowed  temples  are  fester- 
ing masses  of  crime  and  vice  and  gigantic 
swindling.  "  The  sacred  cities  are  the  foul- 
est places  of  all."  Such  facts  and  such  re- 
sults as  these  must  be  fairly  faced  in  any 
comparison  of  the  evidence,  for  or  against 
a  system  called  a  religion,  from  its  influ- 
ence upon  the  lives  and  characters  of  its 
followers.  And  while  it  may  be  wise  and 
right  for  the  missionary,  in  dealing  with 
the  holders  of  these  imperfect  systems,  to 
look  out  in  them  for  some  "  broken  light 
of  God,"  the  student  of  what  is  sometimes 
called  comparative  religion  must  learn 
[84] 


Influence 
what  the  Bishop  of  Rochester  speaks  of, 
as  the  duty  of  "  right  intolerance,  in  these 
days  when  there  is  such  a  tendency  to 
break  down  moral  distinctions  and  throw 
over  everything  the  mantle  of  an  inverte- 
brate charity." 

Now  over  and  against  this  I  set  the  evi- 
dence, in  His  influence  on  life  and  char- 
acter, of  Jesus  Christ  as  revealed  to  us  in 
Holy  Scripture,  and  as  shown  in  His  ef- 
fect upon  the  world.  Two  things  must 
be  borne  in  mind.  First,  it  is  absolutely 
impossible  for  any  man  calling  himself 
unbeliever,  agnostic,  or  by  any  other  anti- 
christian  name,  living  in  our  day  and  gen- 
eration, to  rid  himself  of  the  atmospheric 
element  of  the  nineteen  centuries  of  Chris- 
tianity in  the  midst  of  which  he  lives.  In- 
evitably and  imconsciously  he  is  affected 
by  conditions  which  he  does  not  recognize 
or  realize  as  Christian  or  religious,  which 
[85] 


Evidencej  Experience^  Influence 
nevertheless  have  made  him  what  he  is  and 
given  him  the  freedom  and  fukiess  of  the 
Hfe  which  he  enjoys.  He  cannot  be  as 
though  he  lived  before  or  apart  from  the 
great  fact  of  Christian  civilization.  And 
secondly,  it  must  be  acknowledged  that 
the  influence  of  Christianity  in  Christian 
lands  is  marred  and  maimed  by  the  incon- 
sistency of  the  lives  of  those  who  "  profess 
and  call  themselves  Christians,"  just  as  its 
spread  throughout  the  world  is  hindered 
by  our  indifference.  But  for  all  this,  no 
man  can  deny  the  power  and  the  kind  of 
influence,  upon  human  life  and  upon  hu- 
man society,  which  religion,  as  revealed 
in  and  through  our  dear  Lord,  has  exer- 
cised and  is  exercising  wherever  it  has 
gone.  The  one  single  fact  stands  first 
and  foremost,  that  He  Himself,  the  ideal 
Man,  the  only  sinless  man,  is  the  example 
for  the  rest.  We  are  to  look  to  Him  as 
[86] 


Influence 
He  is  revealed  to  us  in  the  Gospel  story 
and  in  the  history  of  the  Christian  cen- 
turies, as  the  representative  of  the  kind  of 
character  which  His  teachings  are  meant 
to  produce.  On  the  one  hand  are  such  ex- 
amples as  Hercules  or  a  god  Mars,  a  Ma- 
homet, a  Buddha,  standing  for  certain 
merely  human  graces,  defaced  and  dis- 
figured with  human  vices.  On  the  other 
stands  the  Christ,  practising  and  exempli- 
fying the  virtues  of  purity,  of  patience, 
of  meekness,  of  forgiveness  of  enemies, 
of  tenderness,  of  sympathy,  of  active 
ministries  of  mercy ;  and  all  these  mingled 
with  manliness,  with  justice,  with  the 
stern  reproof  of  hypocrisy  or  inmiorality, 
with  a  power  of  righteous  indignation  at 
sin,  with  heroic  courage,  sealing  by  His 
death  the  witness  of  His  life ;  and  with  no 
fault  or  flaw  that  mars  the  ideal  perfec- 
tion of  His  nature.  It  is  quite  true  that 
[87] 


Evidence^  Eccperience,  Influence 
the  graces  which  our  Lord  exempHfied 
and  taught  are  not  those  which  commend 
themselves  to  the  natural  man,  but  it  is 
not  true  that  they  stand  for  anj^  merely 
sentimental  and  unmanly  character.  "  It 
was  reserved  for  Christianity,"  Lecky 
says,  "  to  present  to  the  world  an  ideal 
character,  which  through  all  the  changes 
of  eighteen  centuries  has  filled  the  hearts 
of  men  with  an  impassioned  love  and  has 
shown  itself  capable  of  acting  on  all  ages, 
nations,  temperaments  and  conditions ;  has 
done  more  to  regenerate  and  soften  man- 
kind than  all  the  disquisitions  of  philoso- 
phers and  all  the  exhortations  of  moral- 
ists; has  indeed  been  the  well-spring  of 
whatever  has  been  best  and  purest  in  the 
Christian  life."  Surelj^  this  influence  is 
the  crowning  evidence  of  revealed  reli- 
gion; from  the  very  beginning  in  the  dim 
adumbration  of  type  and  prophecy, 
[88] 


Influence 
through  the   slow  but   gradual   develop- 
ment of  the  Christ  that  was  to  come,  un- 
til it  all  breaks  forth,  like  the  sun  in  the 
splendor  of  its  might,  in  the  incarnate  Son 
of  God,  the  fulfilment,  the  realization  of 
the  hope  of  the  ages.    And  the  end  is  not 
yet.    It  is  not  a  mere  matter  of  knowledge 
and  possibility  that  all  this  comes  to  you 
and  me,  it  is  the  laying  upon  us  of  an  in- 
calculable   responsibility.      No   man   can 
measure  the  accountability  of  personal  in- 
fluence and  example.    It  is  to  be  the  priv- 
ilege of  some  of  you  to  proclaim  the  riches 
of  the  everlasting  Gospel,  to  be  teachers 
and  preachers  of  the  word.     There  come 
to  all  of  us  who  look  for  them,  and  have 
the  courage  of  our  convictions,  opportu- 
nities often  to  speak  the  word  which  may 
"  convert  a  sinner  from  the  error  of  his 
ways " ;  and  in  the  various  relations  of 
life,  fathers  and  mothers,  husbands  and 
[89] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
wives,  and  the  elder  brothers  and  sisters 
in  the  family,  masters  and  mistresses, 
sponsors  and  teachers — in  all  these,  the 
power  for  good  or  for  evil,  of  speech  and 
Hfe,  is  mitold.  And  I  believe  it  is  true 
that,  as  the  smallest  stone  strikes  water 
and  makes  an  ever-widening  circle  of 
waves,  so  there  is  no  life  lived  on  the  earth 
so  inconspicuous,  so  insignificant,  but 
touches  some  other  life  with  a  strong  and 
subtle  power  of  influence.  Thank  God 
there  is  an  infection  and  a  contagion  of 
health  and  of  holiness  as  well  as  of  sin 
and  disease.  Our  Lord  does  not  hesitate 
to  class  the  disciples  with  the  Holy  Ghost 
as  His  witnesses, — "  Ye  are  witnesses  and 
so  is  the  Holy  Ghost."  And  to-day  there 
is  no  more  powerful  evidence  of  religion 
than  the  daily  and  hourly  setting  forth  of 
the  life  of  Christ  in  the  character  of  a  man 
or  a  woman  or  a  child.  For  this  we  have 
[90] 


Influence 
not  only  the  fulness  and  perf ectness  of  the 
teaching,  not  only  the  faultless  beauty  of 
the  character  of  our  Lord  (if  this  were 
all,  we  might  well  despair,  because  of  our 
inability  to  be  the  one  or  to  attain  to  the 
other) ,  but  He  who  is  "  the  Way  and  the 
Truth"  is  also  "the  Life";  and  in  the 
abundance  of  His  gifts  of  grace,  in  our 
sacramental  incorporation  into  Him, 
which  makes  us  partakers  of  His  life,  and 
in  His  sacramental  re-creation  and  re- 
newal and  refreshment  of  that  life  in  us 
we  are  "  out  of  weakness  made  strong," 
and  able,  if  we  stir  up  the  grace  that  is 
in  us,  "to  do  all  things  through  Christ 
who  strengthens  us."  And  so  the  life  and 
person  of  Jesus  Christ  becomes,  not  only 
in  Himself,  not  only  in  His  revelation, 
but  in  every  one  of  us,  clinching  and 
crowning  and  conclusive  evidence  of  His 
revealed  religion. 

[91] 


Evidence^  Eooperience,  Influence 
However  unusual,  I  trust  the  method 
of  treatment  of  these  lectures  will  not 
have  seemed  unnatural,  or  remote  from 
the  subjects  selected  by  the  founder.  No 
man,  I  think,  can  set  himself  to-day  fair- 
ly before  the  facts  of  the  existing  rela- 
tions between  science  and  religion  without 
the  conviction  that  what  seemed,  in  the 
first  flush  of  more  thorough  scientific 
research,  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago,  an- 
tagonism and  discrepancy,  has,  by  the  fur- 
ther and  fuller  research,  become  agree- 
ment and  harmony;  and  by  the  same 
process  it  seems  to  me  that  nature  has 
become  more  religious  and  religion  more 
natural.  Lord  Salisbury's  almost  epi- 
grammatic utterance  is  witness  to  the  fact 
that  it  is  not  religion  alone,  but  nature, 
as  well  that  is  confronted  with  mystery. 
"  We  live,"  he  said,  "  in  a  small,  bright 
oasis  of  knowledge  surrounded  on  all 
[92] 


Influence 
sides  by  a  vast  unexplored  region  of  im- 
penetrable mystery,  and  from  age  to  age 
the  strenuous  labor  of  successive  genera- 
tions wins  a  small  strip  from  the  desert 
and    pushes    forward    the    boundary    of 
knowledge."      And    the    sermon    of    the 
Bishop  of  Liverpool  at  the  last  meeting 
of  the  British  Association,  preached  from 
Job's    "  magnificent    description    of    the 
miracles  of  God  as  revealed  in  nature  " — 
"Lo,  these  are  but  the  outskirts  of  His 
ways ;  and  how  small  a  whisper  do  we  hear 
of  Him!    But  the  thunder  of  His  power 
who  can  understand?  " — calls  attention  to 
the  three  great  improvements  to  theology 
which  have  come  from  the  study  of  na- 
ture, "  that  it  had  helped  man  to  realize 
the  present  activity  of  God,  had  brought 
to  him  the  immanence  of  the  Creator  in 
His  creation  and  had  shown  that  atheism 
was  unscientific."    Beside  which,  condens- 
[93] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Ijifluence 
ing  part  of  this  sermon,  the  study  of  na- 
ture helps  men  to  perfect  methods  of  re- 
hgious  inquiry  in  insisting  upon  the  value 
of  facts  and  laws,  because  the  Christian 
faith  rests  on  facts  and  because  law  itself 
plays  a  function  even  in  the  kingdom  of 
grace.  And  the  study  also  produces  a 
spirit  of  humility  and  reverence  and  in- 
creases our  sense  of  mystery  in  the  uni- 
verse and  especially  in  man.  I  am  glad 
to  close  these  lectures  with  the  Bishop's 
truly  noble  peroration. 

"  Such  were  some  of  the  gains  to  theol- 
ogy from  the  study  of  Nature.  But  there 
were  definite  and  distinct  limits  to  the 
teaching  of  Nature.  It  could  teach  much, 
but  not  everything.  It  could  never  take 
the  place  of  religion.  It  could  not  touch 
nor  illuminate  the  highest  problem  of  ori- 
gins. It  had  discovered  no  substitute  for 
God.  Nature  could  give  no  comfort; 
[94] 


Influence 
could  inspire  no  hope;  could  yield  no  evi- 
dence of  personal  immortality.  It  could 
provide  beautiful  analogies  for  a  resur- 
rection, but  nothing  more.  Nature  could 
throw  no  light  on  the  existence  or  removal 
of  sin.  It  could  neither  tell  of  pardon  nor 
of  victory.  The  conscience  spoke  in  ac- 
cents that  could  not  be  ignored.  Nature 
told  them  the  certainty  of  retribution. 
About  forgiveness  it  was  silent.  And 
there  was  soul-hunger.  It  was  true,  not 
only  of  the  prodigal,  but  of  every  man 
apart  from  God,  "  he  begins  to  be  in 
want."  Nature  as  revealed  by  science, 
knew  nothing  of  love.  Nature  had  no  law 
for  life  or  conduct.  She  had  her  victories 
and  her  lessons,  but  she  had  her  limita- 
tions. She  could  not  meet  man's  highest 
aspirations,  nor  solve  the  greatest  riddles 
that  perplexed  his  soul.  Yet  there  was 
One  who  could  speak  where  Nature  is 
[95] 


Evidence,  Experience,  Influence 
dumb — One  who  could  reveal  and  illu- 
minate where  Nature  is  only  cloud  and 
darkness.  There  was  One  who  claimed 
what  no  other  man  had  dared  to  claim, 
and  who  had  j^roved  the  truth  of  His 
claim  by  His  sinless  life,  His  triumphant 
resurrection — the  deathless  influence  He 
exercised  upon  the  thought  and  character 
and  conduct  of  man.  If  only  they  were 
honest  and  patient  and  pm-e  and  humble 
and  earnest  in  their  search,  to  them  in  due 
time,  without  fail,  would  be  given  the 
vision  of  God  in  Christ." 


[96] 


FOUNDERS'   MEMORIAL 

KJENYON  College 
All  Saints'  Day,  1901 


FOUNDERS'    MEMORIAL 

Kenyon  College 

r 

%\\  ^aint^'  2Dap,  X90X 

WE  REMEMBER  BEFORE  GOD  this 
day  the  Founders  of  these  In- 
stitutions :  Philander  Chase, 
the  first  Bishop  of  Ohio,  clarum  et  ven- 
erabile  nomen^  whose  foresight,  zeal,  un- 
wearied patience,  and  indomitable  energy 
devised  these  foundations,  and  established 
them  temporarily  at  Worthington,  and 
permanently  at  Gambier;  he  was  the 
Founder  of  the  Theological  Seminary, 
Kenyon  College,  and  of  the  Grammar 
[99] 


Founders'  Memorial 
School.  Charles  Pettit  McIlvaine, 
the  second  Bishop  of  Ohio,  rightly  known 
as  the  second  Founder  of  these  Institu- 
tions, whose  decision  of  character  and 
self -devoted  labors  saved  them  at  two  dis- 
tinct crises  of  difficulty;  he  builded  Bex- 
ley  Hall  for  the  use  of  the  Theological 
Seminary;  Ascension  Plall,  for  the  use  of 
Kenyon  College ;  Milnor  Hall,  for  the  use 
of  the  Grammar  School;  and  he  com- 
pleted Rosse  Chapel  on  the  foundations 
laid  by  Bishop  Chase. 

We  remember  before  God  this  day 
pious  and  generous  persons,  contributors, 
whose  gifts  enabled  the  Bishops  of  Ohio 
to  lay  those  foundations,  and  who  are 
therefore  to  be  named  among  the  Found- 
ers. We  make  mention  especially  of  those 
who  have  departed  to  be  with  Christ,  and 
now  rest  in  Paradise. 

[100] 


Founders'  Memorial 
Among  the  many,  we  name  only  a  few 
whose  gifts  are  noticeable  because  of  the 
influence  of  their  character  and  position: 

Henry  Clay,  whose  introduction  of 
Bishop  Chase  to  the  Admiral  Lord  Gam- 
bier,  of  England,  initiated  the  movement 
in  1823;  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury; 
the  Lords  Bishops  of  London,  Durham, 
St.  David's,  Chester,  and  Lichfield;  the 
Deans  of  Canterbury  and  Sahsbury; 
Lords  Kenyon,  Gambier,  and  Bexley; 
Sir  Thomas  Acland;  the  Rev.  Edward 
Bickersteth,  Henry  Hoare,  Marriott, 
Pratt,  William  Wilberforce,  Thomas 
Wiggin,  Thomas  Bates;  the  Dowager 
Countess  of  Rosse,  who  aided  Hberally 
the  Chapel  which  afterward  bore  her 
name;  and  Hannah  More,  who  also  be- 
queathed a  Scholarship  which  bears  her 
name. 

[101] 


Founders'  Memorial 
We  remember  before  God  the  liberality 
of  William  Hogg,  from  whom  this  do- 
main was  purchased  under  the  advice  of 
Henry  B.  Curtis  and  Daniel  S.  Norton, 
with  the  consent  of  Henry  Clay;  the 
grantor  contributing  one-fourth  of  its 
market-value. 

In  1828,  John  Quincy  Adams,  the 
President  of  the  United  States;  Mrs. 
Sigourney;  Arthur  Tappan,  who  orig- 
inated the  Milnor  Professorship;  St. 
George's  Church,  New  York,  which  es- 
tablished a  Scholarship;  the  Rev.  Drs. 
Milnor,  Tyng,  Bedell,  Sparrow,  and 
Keith;  the  Rev.  I.  Morse,  Dudley  Chase, 
Albert  Barnes,  John  Trimble,  WilHam 
Jay,  Abbott  and  Amos  Lawrence,  Peter 
Stuyvesant,  Richard  Varick. 

These  were  the  first  Founders  of  these 
Institutions. 

[102] 


Founders'  Memorial 
Among  those  who  aided  Bishop  Mcll- 
vaine,  we  mention  before  God  to-day:  In 
1832,  Bishop  White,  the  Rev.  Manton 
East  burn  and  Ascension  Church,  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Cutler  and  St.  Ann's  Church,  Brook- 
lyn; the  Rev.  Drs.  Mulilenberg  and 
Wing;  Peter  A.  Jay,  James  Lennox, 
Robert  Minturn,  Henry  Codman,  Robert 
Carter,  Matthew  Clarkson,  Charles  Hoyt, 
I.  N.  Whiting. 

And  in  1835,  in  England,  Daniel  Wil- 
son, Bishop  of  Calcutta;  the  Bishops  of 
London,  Winchester,  SaHsbury,  and  Lich- 
field ;  the  Duchess  of  Ivent,  the  Duchess 
of  Gloucester,  the  Princess  Augusta,  the 
Duchess  of  Beaufort,  the  Earl  of  Car- 
narvon, the  Rev.  Thomas  Hartwell 
Home,  Charles  Brydges,  John  Fox,  Jer- 
ram,  Jowett,  Baptist  Noel,  Dr.  Plmnptre, 
Charles  Simeon,  Henry  Thornton,  Sir 
Thomas  Baring,  Henry  Roberts,  archi- 
[103] 


Founders'  Memorial 
tect,  who  gave  the  plan  and  working- 
model  for  Bexley  Hall. 

These  are  the  second  Founders  of  these 
Institutions. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day  the 
gifts  of  Bishop  Gadsden,  Bishop  Johns, 
Colonel  Pendleton,  John  Kilgour,  the 
Kinney s,  Dr.  Doddridge,  Charles  D. 
Betts,  who  founded  a  fund  for  the  pur- 
chase of  theological  books;  the  Rev.  C.  C. 
Pinckney,  who  contributed  for  fitting  up 
a  laboratory;  J.  D.  Wolfe,  who  contrib- 
uted to  found  the  Lorillard  and  Wolfe 
Professorships;  John  Johns,  M.D.,  of 
Baltimore,  who  left  a  valuable  legacy  to 
the  Institutions;  Stewart  Brown,  Will- 
iam H.  Aspinwall,  and  others  who  con- 
tributed to  the  buildings  of  Ascension 
Hall;  Thomas  H.  Powers,  Lewis  S.  Ash- 
urst,  John  Bohlen  and  sister,  and  others 
who  founded  a  Professorship  in  memory 
[104] 


Founders'  Memorial 
of  the  late  Dr.  Bedell  of  Philadelphia; 
Mrs.  Spencer;  Mrs.  Lewis,  who  partly 
founded  a  Professorship;  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Brooke,  the  Rev.  Messrs.  Lounsbury  and 
E.  A.  Strong,  whose  efforts  brought 
many  valuable  contributions  to  these  In- 
stitutions; W.  W.  Corcoran,  President 
Andrews,  and  the  Rev.  Alfred  Blake. 

And  last,  the  philanthropist,  George 
Peabody,  the  intimate  friend  of  Bishop 
Mcllvaine,  who  in  token  of  that  friend- 
ship founded  the  Professorship  that  bears 
his  name. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day,  among 
the  donors  to  this  College,  William  E. 
Gladstone,  late  Prime  Minister  of  Eng- 
land; the  Rev.  Canon  Carus,  and  J.  Pye 
Smith ;  and,  in  the  United  States,  the  Rev. 
Drs.  Dyer  and  Burr,  Professor  Francis 
Wharton,  A.  H.  Moss,  John  Gardiner, 
the  Rev.  Archibald  M.  Morrison,  who 
[105] 


Founders'  Memorial 
founded  the  Griswold  Professorship;  the 
Rev.  Drs.  Muenscher  and  Bronson,  and 
others  whose  names  are  recorded. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day  the 
Rev.  Marcus  T.  C.  Wing,  D.D.,  who, 
besides  being  a  Professor  in  the  Theo- 
logical Seminary,  was  for  thirty  years 
its  financial  agent;  R.  S.  French,  who, 
with  the  assistance  of  friends  at  Mount 
Vernon  and  Gambier,  provided  the  full 
set  of  nine  bells  and  the  clock,  and  placed 
them  in  the  tower  of  the  church,  with 
power  to  ring  the  Canterbury  chimes. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day  Mrs. 
Alfred  Blake,  who  founded  three  Scholar- 
ships to  bear  her  husband's  name.  To 
her  beautiful  soul  may  the  Lord  grant 
peace  and  refreshment  in  Paradise. 

We  reverently  mention  before  God  this 
day  that  venerable  and  apostolic  man  now 
in    Paradise,    the   Right   Rev.    Gregory 
[106] 


Founders'  Memorial 
Thurston  Bedell,  the  third  Bishop  of 
Ohio,  who,  with  the  aid  of  WilHam  H. 
and  John  Aspinwall,  James  M.  Brown, 
Samuel  D.  Babcock,  Wilham  B.  Astor, 
and  other  members  of  the  Church  of 
the  Ascension  in  New  York,  builded  the 
Church  of  the  Holy  Spirit  for  the  use  of 
all  the  Institutions;  through  him  Mrs. 
Bowler  founded  the  Professorship  which 
bears  the  name  of  her  husband,  R.  B. 
Bowler,  who  gave  a  philosophical  ap- 
paratus, and  who,  with  Larz  Anderson, 
Henry  Probasco,  William  Proctor,  and 
others,  founded  the  Mcllvaine  Professor- 
ship; Jay  Cooke  founded  the  Professor- 
ship which  bears  his  father's  name ;  Frank 
E.  Richmond  founded  the  Hoffman 
Library  Fund;  Stewart  Brown  builded 
the  tower  of  the  church  to  bear  the  name 
of  his  son,  Abbott  Brown.  By  the  same 
Bishop  and  his  wife  the  organ  was  placed 
[107] 


Founders'  Memorial 
in  the  church  as  a  memorial  of  the  second 
Bishop  of  this  Diocese,  and  the  episcopal 
chair  as  a  memorial  of  the  great  Founder ; 
members  of  St.  Ann's  Church  in  Phila- 
delphia completed  the  endowment  of  the 
Bedell  Professorship,  among  them  chiefly 
William  Welsh,  John  Bohlen  and  his 
sister,  Thomas  H.  Powers,  and  Robert  H. 
Ives  and  his  wife. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day  Julia 
Strong  Bedell,  the  wife  of  the  third 
Bishop  of  Ohio,  who  with  her  husband 
had  contributed  most  generously  of 
thought,  time,  and  money  to  these  Insti- 
tutions, and  who  may  truly  be  said  to  have 
been  their  most  munificent  Founder.  Her 
gifts  during  her  life  were  constant  and 
imfailing,  and  at  her  death  she  remem- 
bered the  College  with  a  large  bequest. 

We  mention  with  gratitude  the  success- 
ful efforts  of  the  late  President  of  Ken- 
[108] 


Founders'  Memorial 
yon  College,  the  Rev.  William  B.  Bodine, 
D.D.,  to  complete  the  endowments,  and 
the  gifts  that  have  resulted  therefrom, 
namely:  from  Rutherford  B.  Hayes, 
President  of  the  United  States;  Peter 
Hayden,  Dr.  I.  T.  Hobbs,  the  Rev.  Will- 
iam Horton,  Thomas  McCulloch,  Samuel 
L.  IMather,  and  H.  P.  Baldwin;  from 
John  W.  Andrews  a  donation  in  lands  for 
the  foundation  of  Scholarships  in  mem- 
ory of  his  son;  from  Columbus  Delano 
the  hall  which  bears  his  name;  from  Mrs. 
Ezra  Bliss,  of  Columbus,  a  library  build- 
ing, which  bears  the  name  of  Hubbard 
Hall,  in  memory  of  her  brother ;  and  from 
Henry  B.  Curtis,  Scholarships  which 
from  generation  to  generation  foster 
sound  learning. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day  James 
Sullivan  Warren,  of  Boston,  and  John 
Sherman,  late  Senator  from  Ohio,  who 
[109] 


Founders'  Memorial 
left  legacies  to  the  General  Fund  of  these 
Institutions;  Job  M.  Nash,  of  Cincinnati, 
who  founded  the  Scholarships  that  bear 
his  name;  and  Mrs.  Mary  A.  McBride, 
of  Wooster,  who  left  a  bequest  to  found  a 
Scholarship  in  memory  of  her  son,  a  dis- 
tinguished alumnus  of  this  College. 

We  mention  before  God  to-day  Will- 
iam Simpson,  of  Sandusky,  whose  widow 
gave  the  Wilham  and  INIary  Simpson 
Memorial  Fund  for  the  restoration  of 
Rosse  Hall,  which  was  destroyed  by  fire 
May  9,  1897. 

We  mention  with  gratitude  the  gift  of 
James  P.  Stephens,  who  has  contributed 
$18,000  to  found  a  Library  Fund  which 
is  to  bear  his  name,  and  who  gave  the 
funds  for  the  Stephens  Stack  Room. 

For  all  these  generous  gifts  of  the  liv- 
ing, and  for  the  memory  of  the  dead  who 
[110] 


Founders'  Memorial 
were  the  Founders  of  these  Institutions, 
we  give  hearty  thanks  to  God  this  day; 
ascribing  the  praise  of  their  benefactions 
to  His  ahnighty  grace,  and  the  glory  of 
His  most  Holy  Name,  Who  is  the  God 
of  our  fathers  and  our  God,  the  Father, 
the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  one  Adora- 
ble Trinity,  for  ever  and  ever.    Amen. 


[Ill] 


Princeton  Theological  5eminary-5peer  Ubtary 


1    1012  01016  2016 


